Business Commons^™

The Organisational Impact Of Outsourcing On Multinational Businesses Operating In Ireland, Veronica Perdisatt

Theses

This study is an examination and assessment of the effectiveness of outsourcing arrangements currently employed by a sample of multinational organisations operating in Ireland. Informed by previous research, this study employs field research in the form of interviews with experienced and successful practitioners in the outsourcing industry. The study responds to issues of focus, which include the analysis of benefits of outsourcing programs, barriers to achieving outsourcing benefits and identification of unexpected or indirect impacts of outsourcing. This research highlights that from the perspective of operating from a small open economy, outsourcing is one strategy that organisations are increasingly adopting …

Measuring Marital Satisfaction: A Comparison Of The Revised Dyadic Adjustment Scale And The Satisfaction With Married Life Scale, Peter J. Ward, Neil R. Lundberg, Ramon Zabriskie, Kristen Berrett

Faculty Publications

Marital satisfaction has been psychometrically measured using many different instruments not soundly based on theory. The Revised Dyadic Adjustment Scale (RDAS), consisting of 14 items, is commonly accepted by researchers and practitioners tomeasure marital satisfaction but was not specifically designed to measuremarital satisfaction. The Satisfaction with Married Life Scale (SWML), consisting of five items, is a short scale specifically targeted toward measuring marital satisfaction. An online sample collected from 1,187 couples throughout the United States was used to compare these instruments’ correlation (r¼.782), factor structures, reliability (SWML, a¼.958; RDAS, a¼.943), theoretical foundation, and validity. These instruments are on parity with …

Exploring Knowledge Loss In The Contact Center: Key Loss Areas, Contributing Factors, And Performance Metric Implications, Elizabeth M. Herman

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Knowledge loss, or organizational forgetting, is often overlooked in knowledge management frameworks, yet it costs organizations money, personnel, efficiency, and customer service. The purpose of this mixed model case study was to understand, using a model of forgetting as the conceptual framework, where and why loss occurred and to examine performance implications. An inbound telephone contact center was studied because of prolific changes in that industry regarding knowledge complexity and performance. The researcher interviewed 20 participants, observed 63 calls, and reviewed 3 months of performance data including average handle time, first call resolution percentages, and time spent on after call …

Leadership As Role And Relationship In Social Dynamics: An Exploratory Study Seeking A Leadership Archetype, Brian W. Bridgeforth

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Previous research on leadership as archetype considered archetype as metaphor and not as it is understood in other literatures as a collectively accepted and defined role within and across cultures. Archetypical theories are posited as useful because they help us understand universal aspects of human behavior; however, empirical research demonstrating archetypical thinking and behavior remains rare. Accordingly, this phenomenological study investigated whether a leadership archetype exists as a shared cognitive template and if so, what characteristics define it. The theoretical framework used to examine the phenomenon of leadership combined leadership theory, philosophy of the mind, Jungian psychology, social constructionist theory, …

Corporate Social Responsibility Of Architectural Design Firms Towards Sustainable Built Environment In South Africa, Ayman Ahmed Ezzat Othman

Architectural Engineering

The construction industry makes a vital contribution to the social and economic development of every country. Buildings provide their users with places for housing, education, culture, medication, business, leisure and entertainment. None of these buildings will perform its function unless supported with efficient road networks, superlative telecommunications facilities, water and electricity. On the other hand, the construction industry has major impacts on the environment. It is a very large consumer of non-renewable resources, a substantial source of waste, pollution, land dereliction and energy consumption. This highlights the responsibility of present generations to use the available resources in a way that …

The Joint Impact Of Brand Value And Advertising On Corporate Financial Performance And On Stock Return: A Case Study Of The Computer Industry, Alladin O. Ukiwe

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Firm's advertising and marketing expenditures do not always translate to measurable financial returns. Understanding brand value appropriation and financial consequences of advertising is important for more focused investments in branding and marketing. This quantitative study sought to understand the joint effects of advertising expenditure and brand value (BV) on firms return on assets (ROA) and on stock return (SR) in the computer industry. The theoretical framework of the study was the resource-based view theory that proposes that the intangible assets of a corporation have a direct relationship to its ability to sustain its competitive advantage. The key research question involved …

Corporate Social Responsibility In Sport: An Overview And Key Issues, Paul C. Godfrey

Faculty Publications

Sport—writ large—exists as a significant social institution, both in terms of economic and social impacts on the society of which it is a key part. This essay provides a systematic introduction to the concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR) for sport management scholars and practitioners. I review the historical development of CSR in the United States, provide a summary of the major theories and models currently in use by theorists and researchers, and identify key issues facing the CSR discourse. I conclude by returning to the notion of sport as an institution and try to raise questions, as an outsider, …

Adventures In Identity Development: The Impact Of Adventure Recreation On Adolescent Identity Development, Mat D. Duerden, Mark A. Widmer, Stacy T. Taniguchi, J. Kelly Mccoy

Faculty Publications

This study examined the effect of an adventure recreation program on adolescent identity development. Participants included 43 males and 45 females, ages 11 to 15 (M = 13.33, SD = .86). Twenty-two males and 23 females participated in the program, and the remaining youth served as members of a comparison group. Participants completed a two-week adventure program that included such activities as backpacking, mountain biking, white-water rafting, environmental education, and leadership training. The Erikson Psychosocial Stage Inventory was used to measure levels of identity, intimacy, and generativity, and the Identity Styles Inventory was used to assess informational, normative, and …

Influence Of Adapted Sport On Quality Of Life: Perceptions Of Athletes With Cerebral Palsy, Diane G. Groff, Neil R. Lundberg, Ramon Zabriskie

Faculty Publications

Purpose: This study sought to examine the effect of adaptive sports participation on athletic identity and influence on quality of life (QOL) for individuals with cerebral palsy (CP) participating in the CP World Games.

Method: Surveys were conducted with 73 international athletes competing in the 2005 CP World Championships. The survey included descriptive questions about sport involvement and socio-demographics, the Athletic Identity Measurement Scale, and the Influence on Quality of Life Scale.

Results: A significant relationship was found between influence on QOL and athletic identity (r¼0.505; p50.001). There was a moderate negative correlation between influence of adaptive sport …

Supportive Communication, Sense Of Virtual Community And Health Outcomes In Online Infertility Groups, Jennifer L. Welbourne, Anita L. Blanchard, Marla D. Boughton

Management Faculty Publications

Women are turning to online health groups to deal with the stresses and complications of infertility. Online groups may provide a resource that is potentially absent in their face-to-face communities. This study examines how the sense of virtual community (SOVC) that develops in these groups serves as a buffer between perceived stress and physical health symptoms. A sample of 122 women from two virtual communities completed an online survey. Results show that observing the exchange of emotional support was positively related to SOVC while observing informational support was negatively related to SOVC. Further, SOVC was negatively related to physical health …

The Effect Of Remuneration Committee On Directors' Remuneration In Hong Kong, Shuk Fong, Ada Wong

Lingnan Theses

According to the Code on Corporate Governance Practices (CG Code), listed firms should be overseen by a board of directors that promotes the success of the firm through effective direction and supervision of the listed firm’s affairs. Remuneration paid to directors should be sufficient to attract and retain directors of a caliber required to run the company successfully, but companies should avoid paying more than is necessary. The board should appoint a remuneration committee consisting wholly or mainly of non-executive directors and chaired by a non-executive director. The role of the committee is to make recommendations to the board on …

Individual Reactions To Organizational Ethical Failures And Recovery Attempts: A Recovery Paradox?, James Caldwell

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The vast majority of behavioral ethical research focuses on the antecedents of unethical behavior. Consequently, questions involving the consequences of organizational unethical behavior remain largely unanswered. Therefore, extant business ethics research largely neglects the impacts of organizational unethical behavior on individuals. Moreover, questions involving what organizations can do to correct or recover from having engaged in unethical behavior as well as individual responses to those efforts are also mostly ignored. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of unethical activity on employees and explore organizations that have failed ethically and their attempts at recovery. This study …

An Examination Of An Antecedent And Consequences Of Supervisor Morally Questionable Expediency, Rebecca Greenbaum

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Supervisor morally questionable expediency occurs when subordinates perceive that their supervisors engage in morally questionable behavior to expedite their work for self-serving purposes (Greenbaum & Folger, 2008). A supervisor's preoccupation with the bottom-line (Greenbaum, 2007; Greenbaum & Folger, 2008; Wolfe, 1988) is examined as an antecedent of morally questionable expediency. It was hypothesized that subordinates experience deontic reactions (Folger, 2001) in the form of a moral psychological contract violation. Consequently, subordinates were hypothesized to reduce performance, engage in antisocial behavior and supervisor-directed deviance. Survey data from 259 subordinate-supervisor dyads provided general support for this hypothesized model. However, post hoc analyses …

Procter & Gamble’S Pur Water Purifier: The Hunt For A Sustainable Business Model, Lisa Jones Christensen, Jessica Thomas

Faculty Publications

Over the last 6 years, under the leadership of Dr. Greg Allgood, director of the Children’s Safe Drinking Water Program, P&G has helped to distribute 65 million PuR packets. These packets have been used to purify 650 million liters of water, most often in rural locations. Over time, and through a variety of deliberate partnerships that Allgood cultivated in 10 countries, P&G has tested three different sales and distribution models: commercial marketing, social marketing and disaster relief-- each with varying degrees of success. Drawing from past successes and failures, Allgood is considering how to fulfill P&G’s aggressive commitment to providing …

Family Leisure Satisfaction And Satisfaction With Family Life, Joel R. Agate, Ramon B. Zabriskie, Sarah Taylor Agate, Raymond Poff

Faculty Publications

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between family leisure satisfaction and satisfaction with family life. Zabriskie’s Family Leisure Activity Profile was used to measure family leisure satisfaction. The Satisfaction with Family Life Scale was used to measure satisfaction with family life. The sample consisted of 898 families from throughout the United States. Results indicated a relationship between all family leisure satisfaction variables and satisfaction with family life. Data collected from parents and youth provided insight into the relationship between family leisure satisfaction and satisfaction with family life. At the parent, youth, and family levels, core family …

Strategic Ambidexterity In Innovation: An Indispensable Capability In The Face Of Change, Janet K. Tinoco

Management, Marketing and Operations - Daytona Beach

Ambidexterity is a dynamic capability that maybe fulfilled through prudent implementation of organizational processes necessary for product innovation. In this research, a model is tested using data collected from US high technology manufacturers. Results indicate that firms interested in pursuing strategic ambidexterity in innovation should implement all the studied processes in order to improve radical and incremental innovation output. Furthermore, post hoc exploratory analysis suggests that US high technology industries appear to be divided as to the levels of exploration, exploitation, and ambidexterity that they attain.

The Intersection Of Punctuated Equilibrium And Leadership Emergence Within The Framework Of Naturalistic Decision Making, Linda Moerschell

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Punctuated equilibrium, a theory of unexpected and sudden change arising out of evolutionary biology and paleontology, has been applied to decision sciences, physics, organizational theory, and group behavior but never to leadership emergence theories. The purpose of the study was to discover how leadership emerges during a period of punctuated equilibrium, a sudden and unexpected change event, using a naturalistic decision making framework. Thus, the research question probed how leadership emergence could be theoretically modeled in a critical event. This grounded theory study was particularly unique because it drew from, and helped unify the four scientific foundations of complexity science, …

Managing Generational Diversity In The 21st Century, Matthew Joshua Rohden

Honors Program Theses

"Much has been written to describe generational differences in today's workforce, including the problems of managing ateam of multi-generational workers. These differences are often a source of conflict among employees but they could also be a source of strength." (Patota, 2007) This research is intended to show what type of generational diversity is present in the workplace in Iowa. It will be designed to show what types of conflict are common in the workplace due to generational diversity. Another aspect is the perception of each generation towards the other generations which will also be covered by this research. This information …

Engagement In The Workplace: Incorporating Athletic Team Characteristics Into The Business Community In An Effort To Alleviate Male Disengagement, Matthew J. Bries

Honors Program Theses

This paper will focus on the idea of leveraging athletic team characteristics within the workplace in an attempt to alleviate disengagement amongst males. In order to understand what this disengagement is and how to alleviate it, three central themes, motivation and its relationship with engagement, engagement itself, and the power of identification in organizational engagement, will be discussed. Lastly, recommendations developed from a synthesis of engagement and athletic research will be presented.

Contributions Of Family Leisure To Family Functioning Among Families That Include Children With Developmental Disabilities, Dorthy C. H. Dodd, Ramon Zabriskie, Mark A. Widmer, Dennis Eggett

Faculty Publications

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between family leisure involvement and family functioning among families that include children with developmental disabilities. The sample consisted of 144 families (144 parents and 60 youth). Data were analyzed from the parent, youth, and family perspective. The Family Leisure Activity Profile (FLAP) was used to measure family leisure involvement. FACES II was used to measure family functioning. A scale based upon the definition, classification, and systems of support manual of the American Association on Mental Retardation adapted by Dyches was used to measure the level of support needed by the …

Top Management Team Heterogeneity, Global Strategic Posture, And Firm Performance: Evidence From Mnes Headquartered Around The World, Adrian Gil

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This study empirically examines the relationship between top management team (TMT) heterogeneity and firm performance for a sample of multinational enterprises (MNEs) headquartered in 31 countries from across the globe. Utilizing the theoretical perspectives of upper echelons (Hambrick & Mason, 1984) and information processing (Daft, Bettenhausen, & Tyler, 1993; Galbraith, 1973), I hypothesize that global strategic posture, a measure of the intensity of a firm's involvement in the multinational business environment, moderates the relationships between TMT heterogeneity and firm performance. My findings reveal an "enhancing" interaction (Cohen, Cohen, West, & Aiken, 2003: 285-286) between the different TMT heterogeneities investigated and …

A Study Into The Use Of Business Process Reengineering In Re-Designing Procurement Processes Within The Southern Health Board, Treasa Dempsey

Theses

Prior to undertaking the implementation of an integrated finance and procurement information system, the Southern Health Board (now know as the Health Service Executive - Southern Area) undertook a Business Process Reengineering project to redesign, standardise, streamline, and document their procurement processes. This study examines how useful Business Process Reengineering can be in a public sector environment, using the project undertaken in the Southern Health Board, as a case study. The literature on BPR, in conjunction with the material from the BPR project, and interviews from relevant project team members, is examined. The case study demonstrates that it may be …

The Leader's Experience Of Relational Leadership: A Hermeneutic Phenomenological Study Of Leadership As Friendship, Deborah A. Fredericks

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

There are many ways to lead others, all of which involve a relationship among parties. However, the heartbeat of leadership may be a leader's relational sensibility. This research explored the leader's experience of relational leadership and the extent to which the metaphor of leadership as friendship described its qualities. It also explored whether actual friendship between leaders and followers was possible with this form of leadership. The topic of relational leadership was approached through a hermeneutic phenomenological methodology to explore the lived experiences of six women leaders. Their experience of relational leadership and the degree to which the metaphor of …

The Emergence Of Justice Climate In Groups, Teams, And Organizations: A Theory Of Multilevel Information Aggregation And Judgment, D. Rupp, Elizabeth Layne Paddock

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

We outline a theoretical model of the emergence of justice climate in groups, teams, and organizations, and in doing so integrate multiple justice perspectives (e.g., affective events, fairness heuristic, deonance, justice integration, multifoci justice, overall justice). We propose that justice climate is spawned at the event level, where individuals use their emotional reactions to situations as information in forming fairness judgments. Over time, these judgments about various perpetrators--which may include the evaluation of outcomes, procedures, information, and interpersonal treatment--are aggregated to form individual-level stable judgments regarding the fairness of exchange partners with whom employees interact (e.g., supervisors, co-workers, customers). Through …

Linking Service Encounters To Financial Performance: An Extended Approach To Valuation, Carla Yvonne Childers

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Managers and researchers have become increasingly interested in linking marketing activities to firm financial performance. That is, they desire to make marketing more financially accountable. One approach to achieving this goal has been to “valuate” customers to determine their degrees of profitability over the lifetime of their relationships with firms. However, traditional customer valuation techniques are largely based on quantitative factors and do not account for softer measures such as a customer’s behavior and performance both during and after service encounters.

Additionally, while customer profitability is commonly valuated, employees are not generally assessed in this manner in profit linkage frameworks. …

Demographic, Behavioral And Perceptual Comparisons Of The U.S. Visitor Experience With Group Package Tours And Free Independent Travel To China, Mark A. Bonn, Howook Chang, Jerome Agrusta, H. Leslie Furr, Woo Gon Kim

Management: Faculty Publications

U.S. visitor demand for the China travel experience is anticipated to rise significantly through 2105, causing the Chinese government to employ 100 million service providers over the next six years and raising concern about service delivery and perceptions of the on-site China experience. In an effort to better understand these issues concerning U.S. visitors, this study investigated two specific types of U.S. travelers to China: Group Package Tour (GPT) visitors and Free Independent Travel (FIT) visitors. Results indicated that GPT visitors were more likely to be older and have higher household income than FIT visitors. Four trip-related characteristics of GPT …

The Creole Connection: What Happens Next?, Michael L. Thomas, Linda G. Mullen

Marketing: Faculty Publications

The purpose of this case is to demonstrate the importance of target market selection and positioning, particularly for businesses in small college towns. Additionally, other marketing and management issues are presented to stimulate understanding of the multitude of variables that impact restaurant success. This case is intended for those interested in marketing, management, entrepreneurship, hotel/restaurant management or retailing areas.

A Comparative Study Of Organisational Commitment Of Bank Employees In Ireland And China, Helen Chen

Conference papers

Organisational commitment has been extensively researched in the Western and non-Western contexts. However, little has been conducted to approach it from a cross-cultural perspective. This paper sets out to fill in the gap by examining bank employees’ organisational commitment in Ireland and China. Data was collected in two American banks, one in Ireland and the other one in China in June 2008. Research results showed interesting and dynamic differences of the three dimensions of the Irish and Chinese bank employees’ organisational commitment with regards to the effects of income, gender and tenure. Implications for managers in Ireland and China are …

Supreme Seafoods, Thomas Cooney

Case studies

Fintan Barrett’s four year old daughter would often turn to him while playing and exclaim “what to do, Daddy?” Indeed, this very question of what to do next had frequently swirled around his own head as he considered the options that were now available to him and his business Supreme Seafoods. Some commentators had described the recent economic crisis as ‘a perfect storm’ and that analogy was particularly apt for someone operating in the fish industry. Although Fintan’s family had worked in the fishing industry for many generations, whether out at sea or processing and selling fish on land, the …

An Integrated Probability-Based Approach For Multiple Response Surface Optimization, Okay Isik

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Nearly all real life systems have multiple quality characteristics where individual modeling and optimization approaches can not provide a balanced compromising solution. Since performance, cost, schedule, and consistency remain the basics of any design process, design configurations are expected to meet several conflicting requirements at the same time. Correlation between responses and model parameter uncertainty demands extra scrutiny and prevents practitioners from studying responses in isolation. Like any other multi-objective problem, multi-response optimization problem requires trade-offs and compromises, which in turn makes the available algorithms difficult to generalize for all design problems. Although multiple modeling and optimization approaches have been …